1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to Universal Serial Bus (USB) and more particularly to a removable mechanism built into a computer for receiving one of a variety of USB electronic devices wherein the removable mechanism is sized to conform to a 3.5-inch floppy disk drive.
2. Description of Related Art
As information and electronic technologies evolve more electronic devices having features of portability and Plug and Play are available for being mounted in personal computers or rugged type computers for industry application. It is also known that modular, portable, and high speed electronic devices complied with the industry specifications are much required in industry applications such as automatic control. For fulfilling the above needs, a number of high speed protocols such as IEEE 1394 and USB are available for external device connections (such as an input/output (I/O) adapters and card readers). However, all of the well known external device connections are implemented by external cables as illustrated in FIG. 3. This implementation has drawbacks of lack of fastening of the coupled external device and being not modular. This often bothers users. Especially, it is unsuitable for industry application. Thus improvement exists.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a USB removable mechanism built into a recess in a computer, the recess sized to conform to a 3.5-inch floppy disk drive and having a receiving space and two USB sockets in the rear, the removable mechanism comprising an actuator plate in the rear, a link having a rear end coupled to one end of the actuator plate, an eject button in the front coupled to a front end of the link, and an eject plate coupled to the other end of the actuator plate; and an electronic device for I/O control or analog/digital conversion detachably mounted in the removable mechanism, the electronic device comprising a front display panel and two rear USB connectors compatible with a single protocol or a common protocol wherein the USB connectors is coupled to and secured to the USB sockets for signal communication. By utilizing the removable mechanism, a number of advantages are obtained such as easy assembly of a desired one of a variety of electronic devices in the recess, easy replacement of the mounted electronic device, Plug and Play, portable, modular, mountable in an existing 3.5-inch floppy disk drive compartment of computer without modification.
In one aspect of the present invention the electronic device is an adapter card.